If you’re dieting, you may want to throw me off a cliff right now.  There is absolutely no redeeming nutritional value to this recipe.  I think of dessert as a choice.  So if I’m choosing, I’m going all out.  I’ll never learn to drink diet coke, I’ll just drink water more of the time.  Sweets are simply not my main priority – now you take away my salt or my wine?  We are going to have issues.  That said, it may be such a phenomenally rich dessert that you can just have a small piece and call it a day.  My sister Allison has phenomenal will power with chocolate.  She really can just have a nibble and save the rest.  I can do that with chocolate, but you put a pound of cooked bacon in front of me?  Don’t count on any bacon left for your children’s breakfast.  All that said, everyone should try a little of this fudge.  It might be life changing.

The only special equipment required for this recipe are a candy thermometer (I think these are almost always glass not digital due to the extreme high temps required) and plastic wrap.  I like the Saran original myself but it’s a total pain to find so I used Saran Premium in this recipe, I imagine Glad Clingwrap would work, I find it just doesn’t stick as well as the others.  Whatever you do, don’t try that press and seal business, I’m still not entirely sure what coats the surface of that stuff and it just seems like one big giant mess.  Candy making can seem intimidating, so I’m going to try and interlace the recipe with step by step photos.

Dark Chocolate Toffee Crunch Fudge Recipe

1 stick plus 6 tbsp butter

1 c. sugar

2 tbsp water

2 tsp vanilla

3 c. bittersweet chocolate chips

3 tbsp butter

1 can (14 oz.) sweetened condensed milk

Grease a cookie sheet with butter.  Cover the sides and bottom of an 8 x 8 glass casserole with plastic wrap as snugly as you can.  Make sure the sides hang over the edges a bit.  In a saucepan over high heat, combine the butter, sugar and water.  Bring to a boil, then start stirring with a wooden spatula.

Continue stirring, beginning to check temperature when you see a distinct color change towards brown. You’re looking for a completed temp of about 310.

Remove from heat quickly add vanilla, stir, then pour onto prepared cookie sheet.  Let cool completely, then gently tap the handle end of a dinner knife at a 90 degree angle to crack toffee.  You only need about half of the toffee for the amount of fudge we’re making, the rest you can eat, feed to your kids, store, save, give to your teacher, whatever.

Take the half of cracked toffee to a large cutting board and use a mallet or the bottom a heavy glass to smash into crumbles.

In the top of a double boiler, combine chocolate, butter, and sweetened condensed milk.  Let rest over barely simmering water, but resist the urge to be productive while you’re waiting.  Chocolate is easy to burn, and frankly, we all need to sit and do nothing every now and again.  Glance at your chocolate mixture every now and again and give it a gentle stir every two minutes or so.  Once chocolate starts melting the process things speed up precipitously and this window is your most likely chance to mess things up.  Once thoroughly melted and stirred, add 1/2 cup of your toffee crumbles and stir again.  Pour mixture into glass casserole you earlier fitted with Saran wrap.  Use a spatula to smooth surface, then top with more toffee crumbles.  Refrigerate at least two hours, then gently use a knife between saran and glass to wedge out the entire block of fudge.

Cut and eat in bliss.

Key Lime Tartlet Recipe makes 24 4inch tartlets

2 box graham crackers

12 tbsp sugar

20 tbsp melted butter

7 egg yolks

2 tsp key lime zest

2 cans sweetened condensed milk (14 0z each)

1 c. key lime juice (takes 25-30 key limes if using fresh)

In a food processor, use the steel blade to process graham crackers into crumbs.  Pour 5 c. of crumbs into a large bowl, and mix with sugar.  Pour in melted butter then stir to combine.  Divide the mixture amongst 24 tartlet molds with removable bottoms.  Press crumb mixture to the edges, then bake in a 350 degree oven for 6 minutes.

Combine egg yolks and zest in a large bowl.  Stir in sweetened condensed milk, then incorporate key lime juice.  Stir then fill each tartlet cup almost to the top of crust.  Bake in a 350 oven for 20 minutes, then check to see if center is firm.  Let cool in tartlet pan then push up from bottom to serve.

Key Lime Pie Recipe

1 and 1/2 sleeves of graham crackers

5 tbsp butter, melted

3 tbsp sugar

7 egg yolks

2 tsp key lime zest

2 cans sweetened condensed milk (14 0z each)

1 c. key lime juice (takes 25-30 key limes if using fresh)

In a Cuisinart or other food processor with large blade, process graham crackers to tiny crumbs.  In a large bowl stir 1 and 1/4 c. of the graham cracker crumbs, sugar, and melted butter until well combined.  Press mixture into a 9 inch pie pan and smooth to create an even layer on bottom and sides.  Bake in a 350 degree oven for 6 minutes.

In a large bowl, combine the egg yolks and zest.  Add sweetened condensed milk and stir to incorporate.  Add lime juice and continue whisking until all combined.  Pour into prepared crust then bake about 25 minutes longer.  Check for a firm center, then remove and cool.  Refrigerate at least four hours, then serve topped with a dollop of whipped cream.

My Internet research on Butterscotch Pudding led me to a recipe by David Lebovitz, whom I saw speak this fall.  His recipe calls for cassonade sugar.  It seems that cassonade is a french version of very slightly refined raw sugar, while Rapadura is the evaporated, pressed juice from sugar cane.  I’ve trolled hundreds of sites in both french and english trying to figure out the difference between the two, and that was about as much info as I could come up with on the two.  SMIL brought me a brick of Rapadura from Brazil this fall, and I tried out this recipe using it.  Thanks, SMIL!  I love trying out new ingredients!

The Rapadura originally comes in a brick, which you’re then supposed to heat in a 200 degree oven where it melts, then you can break it up into small pieces and run it through a cuisinart to granulate it.  Here’s a pic of mine melted.

Mine didn’t turn into crystals in the Cuisinart, instead it turned into a big sticky mess so I just kept it in broken toffee like chunks.  I just popped a bit back into the cuisinart tonight to find it’s less sticky now, though I still think the chunk application will work better for me.  Here’s a pic after processing.

The flavor was perfect for the recipe.  If you don’t have either of these sugars on hand, try a panela, jaggery, or a demerara sugar from a specialty foods store, or just regular old dark brown sugar.

Butterscotch Pudding (adapted from David Lebovitz’s recipe)

serves 8 small or 5 large servings

4 tbsp butter

1 and 3/4 c. stacked, broken pieces of Rapadura, (mine are large leaving lots of empty space in measuring cup, if you’re using crystals or dark brown sugar, only use 1 c.)

3 tbsp cornstarch

2 and 1/2 c. 2% milk

2 eggs

2 tsp Jack Daniels

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

In a sauce pan, melt butter on low heat, add rapadura and stir occasionally with a wooden spatula, heating until sugar melts and is a bubbling mixture.  Remove from heat.

Mix cornstarch and 1/4 c. milk with a whisk until smooth.  Add eggs and continue to whisk.

Add remaining milk  1/4 c. at a time to melted rapadura, whisking continuously, integrating without hardening the sugar mixture by adding too much cold liquid at once.  Follow with the cornstarch mixture.

Return pan to medium high heat and bring to a boil, whisking continuously.  Once boiling, reduce heat to a simmer and cook another minute, whisking continuously.  Remove from heat when thickened to a ketchup consistency.  Quickly whisk in Jack Daniels and vanilla, then pour into ramekins.

Refrigerate for at least four hours, then top with whipped cream and chocolate chips.

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Chili, like tortilla soup, seems to be a dish that means different things to different people.  I started to enter a contest earlier this year where part of the instructions required a smooth consistency of meat to gravy, containing no identifiable vegetables at all.  And some people think of chili only being a dish served so spicy it demands several beers in rapid succession to keep your taste buds from being destroyed.  This turkey chili with black beans recipe is not very spicy – you can adjust the amounts of cayenne and chili powder to increase the intensity to your desire.  You also could add half of a minced jalapeno in with the garlic, similar to the method I use in my tortilla soup.  I prefer to spice mine at serving with a sprinkling of red pepper flakes.  Enjoy experimenting!

Turkey Chili with Black Beans

2 tbsp olive oil

2.5 lbs ground turkey

1 large white onion, finely chopped

1 red bell pepper, finely chopped

4 cloves garlic

5 tomatoes on the vine, chopped

1 and 1/2 tsp kosher salt

1 and 1/2 tbsp chili powder

1/4 tsp cayenne

12 turns fresh ground pepper

1 and 1/2 tsp ground cumin

4 c. chicken stock

1 can black beans, rinsed and drained

Toppings: shredded cheddar jack cheese, diced onion, and crushed red pepper

Heat a heavy bottomed stock pot on medium heat.   Add olive oil and saute onion and bell pepper 8 minutes.  Add ground turkey, increase heat to high and brown thoroughly.  Add garlic, cook another minute.  Add tomatoes, spices and stock, bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer for 2 hours.  Add black beans, simmer another 30 minutes.  Serve and enjoy!

As for creating the spectacular caramel crust, I highly recommend a torch.  You can caramelize it using your oven broiler, but the key lies in getting the brulees so close to the burner it’s difficult and definitely hazardous.  The pictured version was done in a broiler, just to see if I could pull it off, but my advice is strongly in favor of the torch.  The torch also works much more quickly, enabling you to maintain a chilled temperature of your pudding, protecting it’s delicate consistency.  One of the absolute best things about this dessert is, if you plan in advance, which I *rarely* manage to do, these can be prepared up to 2 days in advance.  Just pull them out, let rest on the counter 10-15 minutes, top with the powdered sugar, and torch the surface.  Dessert to the table in minutes.   I wouldn’t recommend torching them immediately out of the fridge, the rapid change in temperature from the torch could shatter your ramekins.

Crème Brûlée makes 4 small or 3 medium ramekins

1 c. heavy cream

1 c. half and half

3 egg yolks

1/4 c. sugar

1 vanilla bean

powdered sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 325.  Pour creams into a sauce pan, then split the vanilla bean and scrape the pulp into the cream.  Add the vanilla bean hull, then bring cream to a boil, stirring with a wooden spatula continuously.  Cover and remove from heat, letting stand 15 minutes.  Remove vanilla bean hull and discard.

In a bowl, combine egg yolks and sugar.  Whisk until color begins to lighten and sugar is thoroughly combined.  Pour a teeny bit of the warm cream into the eggs, whisking continuously.  Continue adding very small portions of the cream to eggs, whisking continuously until all combined.  Pour into ramekins.  Place ramekins in a glass casserole, then pour warm water in casserole to soak your ramekins in a bath.  Put casserole in oven and bake for 45 minutes.  Check ramekins by wiggling to ensure that sides are firm but center wiggles, then remove or cook more depending on your results.  Let cool on counter for 15 minutes, then chill in refrigerator – at least 3 hours, up to two days in advance.

Sprinkle custard surfaces with powdered sugar, then use torch to caramelize sugar until light brown.  Serve immediately!

This recipe is written as I made the soup, which is certainly a time intensive method – but there are several shortcuts you could employ.  If your freezer is home to one of my staple whole roasted chickens minus the breast meat which was eaten at an earlier date, skip the first paragraph and throw your freezer portion in the pan with 2 raw split breasts.  If your freezer is bare AND you’re short on time, use 3 raw split breasts and cook for at least an hour before adding your vegetables if you can – but even 30 minutes will get you started.  When you are lacking a whole or part of a roasted chicken your broth isn’t going to be as flavorful, and there will be more room in your pan.  So cover the split breasts, then when you add the veggies, add 4 cups of chicken stock.  If you have cooked white rice on hand, that would totally work as well, I just like this method since the rice absorbs some of your stock’s flavor without stealing all of the stock thus leaving you with a thick, dry soup.

Now get out there and make some for yourself, and a friend, or just throw it in your freezer in individual sizes to bring you through the winter!

Lemony Chicken with Rice Soup Recipe

1 whole chicken approx 5 lbs, rinsed giblets and neck removed

1/2 a lemon, cut into 4 pieces

4 large cloves garlic

1 and 1/2 tsp kosher salt

1/4 tsp fresh ground pepper

olive oil

5 stalks celery, sliced

4 carrots, peeled, then sliced lengthwise, then again, then chopped into 1 inch slivers on an angle

1 yellow onion, peeled, sliced, then rounds sliced into quarters

2 bay leaves

2 c.  long grain white rice

3 tablespoons fresh squeezed lemon juice

1/4 tsp crushed red pepper

Preheat oven to 425.  In a roasting pan fitted with a rack, stuff the chicken cavity with the lemon pieces, garlic, salt and pepper.  Drizzle skin very lightly with olive oil, then sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Roast chicken in oven for just over an hour – if you’re going to eat the breast meat at this point, you’ll need to keep cooking it to a safe internal temp of 165.

Since I’m going to continue boiling mine, I took it to 145, then put it in the stock pot and covered with water.  Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer, for 2 hours.  Add celery, carrots, onion, and bay leaves, simmer another hour.  Carefully remove the chicken with turkey forks or a fish spatula, being sure to remove all bone pieces from stock.  Shred chicken meat with two forks, then return to broth.  Add 2 teaspoons kosher salt and 15 turns fresh ground pepper.

Cook rice in  four cups of boiling water.  Reduce heat to a simmer, cook covered about 15 minutes – until mostly cooked, then remove with a slotted spoon, drain, then add al dente rice to soup.  Cook 10 more minutes in covered soup pan.  Add lemon juice and crushed red pepper.  Simmer another 5 minutes, then adjust seasonings to taste.  Serve and enjoy!

I’m a big fan of the slow food movement.  If you’re not familiar and don’t want to read that wikipedia article, my 30 second summary of what slow food means to me is based on creating foods from start to finish using natural, less processed, more local, more seasonal ingredients to cultivate healthy, whole meals which are good for your body, nourish your soul, and create great conversation.  Now I live a very moderate lifestyle, meaning attempting to use moderation in all (most) that I do.  And I certainly don’t mean to insinutate that I never go through a fast food drive through.  Some things catch my attention in the prepared foods market, like the woman I witnessed seeking pimento cheese at the grocery today.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but pimento cheese has about five ingredients.  If you buy it preprepared, there’s also going to be preservatives and other stuff, and it’s stored in plastic, and you have to throw away (recycle) the container.  I’m not overly concerned by getting sick from plastic or food preservatives, but I know it will taste fresher and better if I made it myself.  And I get the satisfaction of my time in the kitchen.  I realize that not everyone derives as much joy from food prep as I do, and to you fellow groceryer, I am in no way insinuating that a market should not exist for you to purchase prepared foods.  I just love what I do, and this is what works for me.

So the dip is quick and the pitas are not.  Though if you’d asked me last week how to make homemade pitas, I would have shrugged and my initial thought would be that it would probably require a special oven or at a minimum, special equipment.  Internet, I am here to tell you – that is not true.  There in lies the power of food blogging.  I write this blog for me.  I love that people enjouy reading it, but it started because I thought someday I might like to write a cookbook.  Before this year I’ve never written any of my recipes down, and my recipe box probably contains a sad 25 note cards.  Plus, I could talk about food, think about food, read about food, and create food all day long and that gets boring for my loved ones.  I read a lot of blogs in the past several years, but ironically, no food blogs.  I had no idea how large and crowded this community was.  It’s a phenomenal wealth of information available for you, the Internet, free of charge.  I think the end result will be that we’ll all wind up phenomenollay better cooks, and more and more people will realize the pleasure of dining intertwined with the pleasure of creating.  So thank you google, and thank you FoodieFarmGirl, and all the others to be unveiled during my adventures in pita making and beyond.

Cannellini Bean, Artichoke, and Fresh Rosemary Dip adapted from Farmgirl Fare

1 can organic cannellini beans, rinsed and drained

1 can artichoke hearts (not the marinated kind!), rinsed and drained

2 very large cloves garlic, chopped

3 tbsp fresh lemon juice

4 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

1/3 c. finely grated fresh Pecorino Romano Cheese

1 tbsp chopped fresh Rosemary

ground sea salt

fresh ground pepper

Place first four ingredients in a food processor, pulse for 3 minutes, then turn to on for 3 more minutes.  Keep your food processor in the on position and drizzle olive oil through top to emulsify.  Pour contents to a bowl and stir in  rosemary and cheese until combined.  Season to taste with salt and pepper.  Chill for at least two hours, then serve on crostini or pita chips.

I originally served this tossed with gemelli pasta and shredded chicken.  To be honest, I’m not really a huge pasta fan.  Or rice.  Or other side grains.  I started wondering halfway through my meal why in the heck I had served it this way.  Because I really would have rather had this pesto lovingly served on the side of beautiful roast bone in chicken breasts, with a vegetable for a side, that could share the dipping glory with the bites of chicken breast.  Then I remembered.  I am very used to preparing straight to the table meals, cooked to order so to speak.  But every so often the occasion arises where I need to prepare a dish well in advance.  Pasta dishes are good for this sort of thing.  You could totally serve this cold.  Or warm it just before serving, and it would still be good – in fact probably better if the pasta had time to rest in the pesto and let the flavors lovingly meld together.  So if it’s your turn to host your book club, make this the day before and pull it out right before the guests arrive.  Or if your friend has a baby, and it’s your night to bring dinner – try this out, because it’s wildly difficult to make and deliver fresh roasted chicken breasts, I know, I’ve tried it.  Or any other occasion falling into that Make and Store Category that remains so empty on my side bar.

But the way I advise eating it – to really get the flavor kick – is the way pictured in the top photo.  I made the crostini from half a loaf of leftover baguette, which I revived with a bit of water in a paper bag in the microwave for 20 seconds.  Unless you’ve recently broken it off with your vampire love interest and you’re trying every angle to keep him away, don’t rub the bread with garlic the way I usually do, just generously lather it with olive oil.  The garlic really has a way of becoming more pronounced when the pesto comes out of the fridge on the second day.  This would also be delicious on cucumber slices or veggie sticks.

1 can artichoke hearts in water, rinsed and drained

3 tbsp chopped Italian parsley

4 large cloves garlic

1 c. grated Parmesan Reggiano cheese

4 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice

1/4 c. slivered blanched almonds

1 tsp kosher salt

8 turns fresh ground pepper

3 tbsp olive oil

Combine all ingredients except the olive oil in a food processor.  Pulse to chop, then turn food processor to on/medium, then slowly drizzle in olive oil from top to emulsify.  Continue to run food processor until you like the texture.

I wound up making quite a few other changes to arrive at my own version.  We’re still out of white wine, so I again went with vodka.  I think chicken is highly preferable roasted, so instead of boiling it like the recipe requests, I roasted chicken breasts, then used less water and more chicken stock to provide a base for the sauce.  I didn’t have dried basil on hand and probably wouldn’t have used it if I had, so I opted for a bay leaf and fresh Italian Parsley mixture that gave the stock a lovely color.  I also used my homemade breadcrumbs instead of herbed stuffing.  Then to top it all off, after nearly abandoning ship on the recipe entirely, I failed to notice they only wanted you to use 2 of 4 cups of chicken broth, so my liquids were off and I wound up with a thinner and cooked much longer sauce.  I’d like to point out that the technique for separating the fat from homemade chicken broth in the Cooking Light recipe is pretty novel.  I’m hesitant to put hot things in plastic, and actually, hesitant to waste plastic in general, but it does seem like a handy trick to keep in the back of the mind for just in case situations.

Also, were chicken breast halves REMARKABLY smaller in 1998?  I can’t remember, but the recipe calls for 6 breast halves and 4 thighs, I used 3 chicken breast halves and wound up with the required 4.5 cups of shredded chicken.  *Shrug* go figure.

Decent casseroles, let alone healthy casseroles, capable of being prepared in advance, then say, delivered are almost non-existent.  The whole reason my sister and I were discussing casseroles to begin with was due to me considering purchasing Park Avenue Potluck: Recipes from New York’s Savviest Hostesses.  I was guessing it wasn’t going to contain a recipe for broccoli, rice, and cheeze casserole.  I glanced through it quickly, and it didn’t actually strike me as portable or potluckable food at all.  I may definitely have been to quick to judge though.  If you have this cookbook, please leave me a comment in the comment section – or email me lane@dinnerandconversation.com – I’d love to hear your thoughts.

NOTES – this recipe is adjusted for my error in the sauce measurements.  No need to reduce broth further.  : )

Chicken and Cremini Mushroom Casserole

(inspired by Cooking Light by way of myrecipes.com)

3 chicken breast halves

olive oil

2 c. chicken broth

1 c. water

1/3 c. vodka

3 tbsps fresh Italian Parsley

2 bay leaves

2 cloves garlic, halved

4 c. cremini mushrooms, sliced

1/4 c. flour

1 c. 1% milk

2 c. breadcrumbs

4 tbsp butter, melted

kosher salt

fresh ground pepper

Preheat oven to 400.  Drizzle rinsed and dried chicken breasts with olive oil.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Roast in oven for approx 40 minutes or until chicken reaches and internal temperature of 165.  Remove skin and bones from chicken, shredding meat using forks.

In a sauce pan over medium heat, combine, chicken broth, water, vodka, parsley, bay leaves, and garlic.  Cook on medium heat, reducing to a quantity of 2 cups, approx 45 minutes.

Grease a 9 x 13 casserole with 1 tbsp olive oil.  Line bottom of casserole with shredded chicken.  In a saute pan, heat 2 tbsp olive oil on medium.  Add mushrooms, saute until soft and moist.  Remove mushrooms and reserve.  If saute pan looks dry, add another tbsp olive oil, then flour.  Cook until paste-like and flour assumes a slightly yellow color.  Add milk, whisk until smooth and thick.  Add broth mixture and cook over medium until thickened, whisking nearly continuously, about 10 minutes.  Add mushrooms then season to taste with salt and pepper.  Pour mixture over chicken.

In a small bowl, pour butter over breadcrumbs.  Stir to combine then sprinkle evenly topping the chicken and sauce.  Bake 20 minutes or until bubbly.